RESEARCH ON MEASURING TEACHING EFFECTIVENESS Roxanne Stansbury EDU 250

Objectives Articulate research findings linking teacher effectiveness and student achievement. Identify key drivers of teacher effectiveness. Review, discuss, and summarize the research evidence as it relates to your future role as an educator.

Research has shown that effective teachers are critically important to student learning. Dallas students who start 2 nd grade at about the same level of math achievement… After 3 HIGHLY EFFECTIV E Teachers After 3 INEFFECTI VE Teachers …may finish 5 th grade math at dramatically different levels depending on the quality of their teachers. Note: Calculating the effects of 3 teachers requires 4 years of test data; hence starting with scores in 2 nd grade and ending in 5 th. Source: Jordan, H., Mendro, R., & Weerasinghe, D. (1997). The Effects of Teachers on Longitudinal Student Achievement. Dallas, TX: Dallas Public Schools 49

First, a few working definitions… Teacher quality: Views teachers from an “inputs” perspective, focusing on credentials and qualifications (e.g., college major, years of experience). o NCLB “highly qualified” follows this approach. Teacher effectiveness: Views teachers from an “outcomes” perspective, focusing on student academic performance and related life outcomes. Teacher effects: The quantifiable contribution of an individual teacher to academic performance o Value-added model (VAM): One of the more common statistical approaches to analyzing teacher effects.

The effectiveness research landscape was void until 10 years ago Prior to 2000: Getting started The last decade: Increased momentum Last 3-5 years: Growing adoption and precision Focused mostly on teacher quality (inputs) Descriptive studies, frail empirical research base Originated mostly from ed schools Early VAM work in Tennessee Accountability push (testing/NCLB) States begin to create powerful data systems, some linking students and teachers “New blood” researchers- mostly economists from outside education- focus research efforts on effectiveness as new data sources become available Explosion of VAM studies and debates about suitability More states/districts able to capture longitudinal student data/link to individual teacher records Traditional education research gatekeepers adopt VAM in broader research practice

Teachers matter. The research community has reached consensus that no other school-based variable (not class size, not facilities, not curriculum) has a greater impact on student achievement than the effectiveness of the teacher workforce. New teacher hiring solutions alone are not a “silver bullet” solution for districts. No matter the rigor of the hiring and training models, all programs will bring in some effective teachers and some that are less than effective, but currently there is no reliable way to determine (predict) who will be effective until those teachers enter the classroom. Teachers are treated like widgets. Schools and districts do not act on variability in teacher effectiveness. Individual teacher effectiveness is almost never considered in critical decisions like teacher hiring, development, and retention, and huge dollars are sunk into interventions and programs that have not been shown to have meaningful impact on teacher effectiveness. High level summary: teacher effectiveness research base to date

Standard Deviation Change in Student Achievement Clotfelter, Ladd & Vigdor (2007), Reading Rivkin, Hanushek & Kain (2005), Math Rivkin, Hanushek & Kain (2005), Reading Kane, Rockoff & Staiger (2006), Reading Boyd et al. (2006), ELA (Grades 4-5 taught by teachers w/ 2 yrs experience) Kane, Rockoff & Staiger (2006), Math Xu, Hannaway & Taylor (2008) Boyd et al. (2006) ELA (Grades 4-5 taught by teachers w/ 2 yrs. experience) Clotfelter, Ladd & Vigdor (2007), Math Clotfelter, Ladd & Vigdor (2007), Reading Clotfelter, Ladd & Vigdor (2007), Math Clotfelter, Ladd & Vigdor (2007), Reading Nye, Konstantopulous & Hedges (2004), Math Nye, Konstantopulous & Hedges (2004), Reading Effects of Teacher Characteristics on Student Performance When searching for effective teachers, qualifications provide some insight – but past performance is by far the best indicator.

But the most consistent predictor of future teacher effectiveness is past success in the classroom Past teaching performance Matters Less/More Licensure test scores Undergrad status Advanced degrees Traditional certification “Bundled” credentials Subjective qualities (beliefs; dispositions) Teacher effectiveness

Considering credentials alongside teachers’ attitudes is a start, but the best predictor of future effectiveness is past performance Considering a range of characteristics together—including teacher attitudes and beliefs— may help predict teacher effectiveness. (e.g., Clofelter, Ladd, & Vigdor, 2007) Research shows that certain teacher attitudes are predictive of classroom effectiveness. Teachers’ confidence in their capacity to improve student achievement is associated with actual student learning gains (Goddard, Hoy, & Hoy, 2000) Negative teacher expectations about their students and work environment are associated with decreased student performance (Pallardy & Rumberger, 2008) Still, the best predictor of a teacher’s effectiveness by far is past performance. (e.g., Gordon et al., 2006; Nye, Konstantopolous, & Hedges, 2004; Rockoff, 2004) Prior value-added scores are even better predictors of performance than principal evaluations (Jacob & Lefgren, 2008) Having teachers who have previously been top performers yields large learning gains Students whose teachers ranked in the 90th percentile scored 0.33 standard deviations higher on the Stanford 9 in math and 0.46 standard deviations higher in reading than those whose teachers had been in the 50th percentile (Nye, Konstantopolous, & Hedges, 2004) Being in a classroom with a top-quartile teacher vs. a bottom-quartile teacher eliminates about half of the Black-white achievement gap (Gordon et al., 2006)